Caption: Painting showing Lomonosov observing the transit of Venus across the solar disk on 26 May 1761. Mikhail Lomonosov (1711-65) was a Russian astronomer and polymath. He made the observation using a refracting telescope with a crude solar filter made from smoked glass. He noticed a bulge or arc of light on the edge of the solar disk as Venus appeared to pass it. He attributed this to an atmosphere on Venus refracting the sunlight. This effect became known as a 'Lomonosov arc'. The original painting is at the Moscow Planetarium.